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Hiding the Grind in STO
commodoreshrvk
Member Posts: 477 Arc User
First off, I want to thank Dan for taking part in some much needed late night conversations with the community. I feel this level of communication, open discussion, is just what the community needs. It does not need to be details of the new content Cryptic wants to surprise us with, rather an open discussion about the game, where it is going, how we feel about particular aspects, and what steps could be taken. This community is anything put passionate and criticism can sometimes come off wrong (especially my own sometimes) in text.
With this behind us, I want to bring up one point that is becoming more pervasive as the game evolves and can be dealt with swiftly because development in this direction is nascent. It is what every MMOer terms "the grind".
Right there Dan does say they want to improve the general feel. We feel the game is leaning toward a more grindy MMO, but why? What can be done? What specific or general actions can be taken to "hide" or "mask" the grind short-term, mid-term, long-term? Can the general paradox of grind in MMO's be re-thought?
I would like this to be a civil discussion that could hopefully be engaging for both the developers and us so for ease of discerning the information please try to keep to the following format. I will go first.
Does the game feel "grindy" to you?
Yes, the shift from a more causal to a game that requires more intensity has left me feeling the game is becoming too grindy. I know many other people who not only use that term but refuse to log in anymore because the game feels "like a chore" or "feels like work rather than fun".
Why do you feel the game is too "grindy"?
I feel it is grindy because the end-game systems are too focal, up front. When logging in, I am hit with the focus my game play being "filling" the boxes rather than playing for enjoyment and filling the boxes later with the fruits of my enjoyable game play. This simply relates to the low diversity and amount of content available for the end-game systems. Although the Romulan Rep system is in better shape in terms of diversity, in general the Fleet and Reputation Systems generally have little content support that needs to be repeated many times. With the large quantities of end-game currencies needed and only a limited amount of content to play through, things become tedious. When things become tedious, they are less fun and the "grind" rears its ugly head.
What do you think can be done to "hide the grind" in the short-, medium, and long-term?
The grind needs to be better hidden in its emphasis; it needs to feel like an eventual outcome of playing the game for fun rather than the focal point. Here is what I think could be done to start "hiding the grind":
Short-term
Bug Pass on Existing Fleet and Reputation Events
This boils down to some of the content for the Tau Dewa Sector remaining in a broken state, i.e. Azure Nebula Rescue Red Alert.
Mid-term
Foundry Spotlight Romulan Missions and Fleet Events
Have members of the foundry community submit these spotlight missions for approval just like the regular spotlight missions. The Fleet Events must be done in a group and reward the Fleet Marks Romulan Missions similar without the need for a group. Thus, only approved and qualified missions count. The Foundry community is a huge and enthusiastic resource that can and is willing to aid in improving the game.
Release Cryptic Designed Missions on a Regular Basis
These two systems have launched and we are seeing little support for them. I think even if every month if Cryptic were able to add one Fleet Event, One Romulan Event, and one Omega Event, over time these three systems would become robust,. What happened to the Fleet Alerts? The random Red Alert system was a great concept that has received virtually no support, it could really be used here.
Review Reputation System Costs
This is in particular for the stores. Is it necessary to have three levels of grinding for the store items that are character bound? Pay resources for the rank, pay resources for the unlock, and then pay resources for the items. Honestly, the appropriate stores should just unlock with you earning the appropriate rank. How many people are going to unlock the Mk X and Mk XI gear stores in the first place since this is an "end-game" system? I understand the need and desire to have rewards at each rank but to have things that will not see great use or purchases tied to additional grinding is not good. In the end, this just leaves the Reputation UI cluttered with missions only a completionist will take.
Long-term
Continued Support of Existing System
With each season publish there should be a few additional missions/events/red alerts that increase the diversity and amount of content. In essence, this back-filling support of the Fleet and Reputation system should continue until the highly repetitive feel has diminished. The fire and forget system we have now needs to be altered to a fire and support system. For a healthy game it is better to have a few diverse, deep, and well supported systems compared to many, shallow, unsupported systems.
Better Initial Planning
Each new system needs to launch with enough variety and amount of content to support it until the next publish. Five or six Fleet events since Season 6?s launch nearly six months ago does not suffice. Although Fleet marks have been added to other content to increase the diversity, and the amount of fleet marks rewarded has been increased, we simply still suffer from a lack of avenues to obtain them. We still require a high amount of repetition on a small content base.
With this behind us, I want to bring up one point that is becoming more pervasive as the game evolves and can be dealt with swiftly because development in this direction is nascent. It is what every MMOer terms "the grind".
And as far as Season 7 being "grindy" - welcome to the MMORPG genre. While it isn't the perfect solution, it is where we are at now. We want to make it better, but it takes time. We will increase the level cap. We will add more reps. We will add more feature episodes. We will add more adventure zones. We will add more ships. We will add more rewards. We will add more of everything that STO needs.
Right there Dan does say they want to improve the general feel. We feel the game is leaning toward a more grindy MMO, but why? What can be done? What specific or general actions can be taken to "hide" or "mask" the grind short-term, mid-term, long-term? Can the general paradox of grind in MMO's be re-thought?
I would like this to be a civil discussion that could hopefully be engaging for both the developers and us so for ease of discerning the information please try to keep to the following format. I will go first.
Does the game feel "grindy" to you?
Yes, the shift from a more causal to a game that requires more intensity has left me feeling the game is becoming too grindy. I know many other people who not only use that term but refuse to log in anymore because the game feels "like a chore" or "feels like work rather than fun".
Why do you feel the game is too "grindy"?
I feel it is grindy because the end-game systems are too focal, up front. When logging in, I am hit with the focus my game play being "filling" the boxes rather than playing for enjoyment and filling the boxes later with the fruits of my enjoyable game play. This simply relates to the low diversity and amount of content available for the end-game systems. Although the Romulan Rep system is in better shape in terms of diversity, in general the Fleet and Reputation Systems generally have little content support that needs to be repeated many times. With the large quantities of end-game currencies needed and only a limited amount of content to play through, things become tedious. When things become tedious, they are less fun and the "grind" rears its ugly head.
What do you think can be done to "hide the grind" in the short-, medium, and long-term?
The grind needs to be better hidden in its emphasis; it needs to feel like an eventual outcome of playing the game for fun rather than the focal point. Here is what I think could be done to start "hiding the grind":
Short-term
Bug Pass on Existing Fleet and Reputation Events
This boils down to some of the content for the Tau Dewa Sector remaining in a broken state, i.e. Azure Nebula Rescue Red Alert.
Mid-term
Foundry Spotlight Romulan Missions and Fleet Events
Have members of the foundry community submit these spotlight missions for approval just like the regular spotlight missions. The Fleet Events must be done in a group and reward the Fleet Marks Romulan Missions similar without the need for a group. Thus, only approved and qualified missions count. The Foundry community is a huge and enthusiastic resource that can and is willing to aid in improving the game.
Release Cryptic Designed Missions on a Regular Basis
These two systems have launched and we are seeing little support for them. I think even if every month if Cryptic were able to add one Fleet Event, One Romulan Event, and one Omega Event, over time these three systems would become robust,. What happened to the Fleet Alerts? The random Red Alert system was a great concept that has received virtually no support, it could really be used here.
Review Reputation System Costs
This is in particular for the stores. Is it necessary to have three levels of grinding for the store items that are character bound? Pay resources for the rank, pay resources for the unlock, and then pay resources for the items. Honestly, the appropriate stores should just unlock with you earning the appropriate rank. How many people are going to unlock the Mk X and Mk XI gear stores in the first place since this is an "end-game" system? I understand the need and desire to have rewards at each rank but to have things that will not see great use or purchases tied to additional grinding is not good. In the end, this just leaves the Reputation UI cluttered with missions only a completionist will take.
Long-term
Continued Support of Existing System
With each season publish there should be a few additional missions/events/red alerts that increase the diversity and amount of content. In essence, this back-filling support of the Fleet and Reputation system should continue until the highly repetitive feel has diminished. The fire and forget system we have now needs to be altered to a fire and support system. For a healthy game it is better to have a few diverse, deep, and well supported systems compared to many, shallow, unsupported systems.
Better Initial Planning
Each new system needs to launch with enough variety and amount of content to support it until the next publish. Five or six Fleet events since Season 6?s launch nearly six months ago does not suffice. Although Fleet marks have been added to other content to increase the diversity, and the amount of fleet marks rewarded has been increased, we simply still suffer from a lack of avenues to obtain them. We still require a high amount of repetition on a small content base.
Post edited by commodoreshrvk on
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Comments
First off, i would be utilizing the foundry community of STO, give them a set of criteria and open up the assets that are need to accomplish this content which you will see why i state this. I think and i don't understand why Cryptic doesn't exploit the need of the community create content. But, in order for this to work effectively they need to also expand and i think overhaul the Universe that currently exist.
We all know that the Universe is tiny in comparison to what it is, it would also allow for that of content not being in short supply, but this would take Cryptic to set a criteria by whomever and state the following;
We need to expand into this area, we are thinking along these lines and you have A, B, C to accomplish, while allowing for 3-6 variants of the content.
Now, some will ask well will this official content. Why not? Isn't that what the foundry was for? This also doesn't take away from what Cryptic authors in new episodes or official missions.
I think that in order to expand the game and not allow it to feel like a grind, the Universe overall needs to be overhauled and iam not saying expand and leave it. No, expand and have content available, that is where the foundry comes in, none of this can be accomplished otherwise, if you cant then what is the point of having the foundry? I don't understand why Cryptic doesn't exploit the foundry community, so many great, great authors.
I want to further add, that we could use a system of exploration to go along with that, to we have been hearing about a territory system forever which would also eliminate a means of grinding and purpose.
I look forward to anyone's responses.
I appreciate venting on the forums; in fact, I was defending the ability to do so in that very thread. But put aside your rage for a few moments when you have an opportunity to actually engage in dialogue with the developers. Rage the other 99.99% of the time the developers seem too preoccupied to pay attention to the players.
And in the same comments he says it's a matter of time; it's a matter of talent and vision - it takes roughly as long to implement bad ideas as it does to implement good ideas.
I literally handed him one of those QoL improvements the genre loves and is normally the domain of Blizzard; we'll see if he has the sense to implement it.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
The o3 - Killed you good
I agree to that notion, that is so right but again it comes around full circle of a content issue. Like i love doing Colony Fleet Mission, that would awesome if it had some variations of that which could be accomplished and many others. Iam not saying the same path, or even eliminating the rotation of enemies, as iam talking different paths of the mission and surprises like we see that giant ape of some sorts.
Yeah, well i go far back into ST Gaming and it has always been a passionate community overall. No escape and iam not trying to say that no other community has this but with it being ST it has that element is issues and people that are very very passionate, more so than normal and it can and will be hard thing to balance. I appreciate him at least trying, i would even perhaps entertain the idea of a forum area that allows users to give technical layout or what they would like to see, which would take Cryptic to come up with perhaps a standard layout. We have seen many people give some great layouts on suggestions.
I think, for me, it's just not 'direct' enough. I can grind some various content, but I'm still plugging in the stuff in that Rep window from anywhere and while it's convenient it's certainly not immersive. I know, it's a big galaxy and it's takes forever to fly from one part to the other but if you had to talk to specific races/people in person sometimes it would feel a lot like I was actually accomplishing something in the process. Under the old STF system I felt more like I was involved in something, having to go to DS9 for the store, the NPC's being there and seeing a lot of other players at that same location brought a feeling of relevance and accomplishment. Now it just feels like going to the lunch room at work when I have enough change to get a Snickers or a Coke.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
The o3 - Killed you good
I agree with your assessment of the situation, i just wasn't sure how to put it and i think you nailed it. I think it is a lack of being persistent? It feels too much in the sense of what you have stated. Its very unfortunate, perhaps they will bring things back around to getting back to that feel that you have described.
Unfortunately true, i understand that and iam rather taken back that they haven't done more in monetizing it when it comes to the C-Store. I guess the boxes are doing that? Iam surprised, we don't see unique clothing, boots you name it people will eat it up as it is trek. Perhaps a plan is waiting to be implemented or something.
I take offense at your use of "basement dweller" when "neckbeard" is available.
I shouldn't have to buy my way into prominence with the Omega fleet, there should be missions in there, doff assignments, diplomatic meetings with Enemies of the borg, and rescue missions like defera on a smaller scale, not simply going to the store and buying my way to the top. I feel that adding a single mission to each tier to unlock the next would be a nice step in making it less of a grind, something other than Kill X y amount of times and dump for rep and repeat.
Just shifting rewards and adding more currencies to grind for with out adding enough new content to compensate is a bad move, and one that is killing Champions online. I really don't want to see this game head in that direction, but the early signs are there and frankly it wouldn't be hard to alleviate the grind yet i don't really see any steps being taken to do so.
And the biggest joke was those compensation crates for the old Omega system. I mean really. You update the game and take away our old system for payment. Now when I finally get to tier 5 everything costs more. And the compensation was not nearly enough for what I lost on my old grind. I had enough for several Borg weapons and officers. The compensation was a flat out insult to our inteligence. They could have left the old reward system in place and let us keep our rewards until they were used up.
Instead they don't tell me they are taking my old grind usless and stealing my rewards.
This is paramount to THEFT IMO.
Theft of our trust and confidence in fairness.
Fairness that is gone from the insulting compensation they gave us!
And even worse is the grind for fleets. Most fleets will never reach tier 5.
And I can tell you from experience if the rewards are as poor as the Omega rewards then again we are taking way to much time to get something that is an insult to most of us. The price us just to high!!
ALso they keep moving the fleet marks around not knowing what they need to do to get people to play the fleet missions.
Look at the real problem. That is not the fleet marks. The grind for fleets is too long. Cut everything by at least 1/3 and it will still be to exspensive.
AND WHY DO WE HAVE TO SPEND DILITHIUM FOR ALMOST EVERYTHING IN THE GAME?
WHY PLEASE TELL ME WHY??????
When adding more rep sytems.. have them at the given locations.
I think the OMEGA could be on DS9.
But that is not the main issue for me. For me is the lack of variety, if the would add some more STF,... like Romulan STF. Add a monthly new "offical" mission or even every second week.. it wouldn't feel such a grind. There would be more variety.
I also feel that you do this featured episodes until you hit level 50 . but then its like the end of that. And suddenly its all about grinding.
.. I have a few things I could add/comment on here .. but I need to think about it first.
Ultimately.. what you said makes perfect sense.. and its a good start.
1)The special items/bonuses are much more easier to obtain. So everybody gets the best stuff. You enjoy it for a couple of days, and then what? Nothing else to get. This will drive people AWAY from the game rather than towards it.
2) Everything goes into the ZEN store/C-Store, which no longer makes the game Free2Play. This would make the spenders very happy, and the less fortunate souls more miserable.
I have played numerous games by well known companies, like EA, Sony etc, and i have to say, i think this is one of the least buggy games which is out there.
STO to me has so much "playability". I've been playing STO for many months now, and i still haven't utilised all the functions that players have! I like that. I like that there is still much more to explore in the game.
Yes, so a few ships have black patches, and the Klingon transporter chief at the shipyard seems to be on controlled substances (hardly ever sends you to the correct destination at Qo'nos), but so what?
I would love STO to upload some pictures of the offices involved in the game as well as the staff just to show everyone the scale of the division which runs STO. I cannot begin to imagine what a huge operation it must be, just to bring us the great game that we have today.
For me, I can only offer massive compliments and appreciation to the STO staff for their serious dedication into the game.
What everyone else should do is stop being "armchair critics" and enjoy the game. If you think you can do better, than please do, I would love to see what you can produce!
Well done to all the staff involved with STO, keep up the good work!
The only ways I can think of to do this are:
1. By making the action so innately enjoyable you do it because you want to do it, and the carrot at the end is just a way to focus your actions. For example, people play FPS games for the FPS action, and not necessarily for the carrot after a million frags. This would be the ideal solution, but it is very, very hard. I mean, even sex or the most delicious foods can get dull after a while if it's always the same few things.
2. By making the more immediate consequences of participating in these repeated actions feel important in some way. Rift (before their expansion) got some of this right with their zone invasions. Unless you fought off and defeated these invasions then gameplay was seriously compromised--NPCs would be dead, mobs would be in the way everywhere, and so on. Of course, this has drawbacks too. Msotly because the participation feels forced even if you want to be doing something else. More moderate ways of doing this are temporary zone bonuses for achieving something.
3. A different psychological approach. An example is an old game: Asheron's Call. They had put the chance for the best loot on so many monsters you found out in the wild, and you also got xp for killing ANYTHING at ANY level, even a lowly lvl 1 rabbit. This basically meant that you were rewarded--and in many cases could get a max reward--for just about anything you did. This is a big psychological boost. It's also sort of like the rat pushing the button to make the pellets come out: with random rewards it causes the rat to push the button far, far more than when the reward rate was known. The downside, of course, is that xp-for-anything is exploitable (bots), and the best loot on random mobs really guts the incentive for participating in harder content.
The easiest way to make an MMO not about grinding is to focus the endgame content on pvp. Which would mean making pvp in this game more worthwhile, and expanding it beyond the handful of queues and the one zone we have now. Ideally with more in terms of rewards and possibly some form of zone-control where territory could be fought over.
If players were spending more time fighting each other, we wouldn't need the time-gated grinds to act as time-sinks and keep people occupied with boring make-work tasks.
There's also ways to structure things so they feel less grindy. It's not fun to do the same missions dozens, scores, or even hundreds of times. It's much more enjoyable to do a series of missions that culminate in a certain reward. The ability to skip missions in STO makes that trickier, but it can still be done by introducing items that are dropped from earlier missions and required for successive missions.
Items can also randomly drop from any encounter (like lockboxes do now) and those items/that "currency" can be saved up to cash in for rewards. That way we can do the content we like and enjoy and still work towards rewards. The system now, with the various marks and currencies, are just ways to railroad players into playing specific content. Which is anti-productive. If someone is forced to play through content they don't enjoy repeatedly in order to earn certain currency items so that they can finally get the reward they need, then obviously that's going to see like much more of a grind to them than if they were allowed to play content they actually enjoy.
Finally, the rep system needs to be changed. I know it's a source of pride for some of the devs, but it's false pride. It's a bad implementation. The whole interface of starting, filling, completing projects just feels stolen from farmville. It could be changed to work more like cxp, with no marks and no rep-xp projects. Instead rep-xp can just be earned automatically for doing appropriate tasks, just like the current commendation system.
The projects to rank up your rep can remain, and add the costs for all the xp projects they would normally have required into the upgrade. But lose the daily xp projects, and it'll be far, FAR less annoying and feel less grindy.
The problem with that idea is, most people don't PvP. For the vast majority of the playerbase, that solution is effectively "don't have any endgame".
In my opinion, this game needs two things. One, it needs a lot of short missions like the exploration missions, but everywhere and more varied and random. These missions should be more than just get five things, or kill five groups of starships. There should be ambush missions, where you're minding your own business and get jumped. There should be patrol missions, where you have to go to multiple systems. There should be trade missions, were you have to pick up some item here, to deliver to someone there. And they should be random. Take any Star Trek episode. Half of them started with the Enterprise on its way to cataloge some nebula, or scan a star, or something, and then stuff happens. These missions should be like that. Starfleet wants you to go here and do this, but when you get there, something happens, you get attacked, or have to rescue someone, or maybe nothing happens and you scan the star and warp away. These missions could all give some marks as rewards as well. If they're in Romulan space, they give Romulan Marks, if the Borg pop up, they give Omega Marks, otherwise, they give some Fleet Marks. Random-ness is the cure for grind, because you never really know what is going to happen, and even if you get something you've done before, its better than knowning exactly what you were going to get.
Thing two, it needs more direct inputs and outputs. You should do things directly to the starbase that improve it and anything you put in, should have a direct and viewable output. Not a progress bar on top of another progress bar. Same with the reputation system. For instance, if we have to keep the marks and dilithium costs, then we should get rid of the progress bars in the omega and romulan reps. If we can afford it, then we should get it. Or going the other way, keep the progress bars but get rid of all other costs, once you have a certain amount of rep, you are awarded the item, or items. I prefer the first personally since it lets you get exactly what you want, and you might not want some of the things in the store.
For the starbase and the other holdings this is a bit harder while keeping the basics of the system around. Probably the best way would be to keep the progress bars, that you donate stuff into and then when they reach a certain level, they automatically give you the upgrade. No cooldowns, no wait times, its just done. For instance, you get to tier one starbase, then halfway to tier two, the build annimation starts, and then when you get to tier two, bingo, you have tier two. And at certain intervales in between the major upgrades can come the smaller ones, like mail access and stuff. Then revamp the provisions so that if someone wants a fleet ship, for example, its more like a store, you give something in and you get a fleet ship.
But bottom line, there should not be any you must do this, to then do that, to finally get what you want. I don't mind if you incorpate the missing costs from the intermediate steps into the new costs, I'm not arguing against the costs, I am arguing that if you put something in, it should directly lead to you getting something out.
Nouveau riche LTS member
While that may be true (I'm not an MMO player/gamer) , yet STO made little to no attempt at hiding the grind with the introduction of two Seasons back-to-back that were 95% grind each .
Plus on top of that you got the Reputations and Embassies that translate to "don't like the big grind ? Here are some smaller versions ." .
Having said that I see a vast difference between the Borg and the Romulan Rep grinds .
The Borg one seems tacked on with no connection what so ever to the Borg story line .
And while the same can be said of the Rom Rep , at least the Rom Rep is used as a form of content gate that could be viewed in positive or negative light .
I think they could take this one step further and somehow put a Rep system in place in a way that you don't feel it's there (you don't move sliders to fill a bucket) .
Instead you get quests from quest givers and earn Reputation that way -- and it is the Quest giver who contacts you to congratulate you on your next level of Reputation , and not another slider that now tells you to move it to unlock your new Rep level .
There is also a question of the wisdom of putting in two Seasons of grind back-to-back , for the simple reason that it is much more noticeable then doing a Season of mostly grind and doing a Season of mostly story .
The powers that be insist that it was the right (if painful) decision .
From a business stand point that may be true .
Coming on the tail of The Year of Hell + the timegate fiasco of the Defara Invasion ?
You be the judge .
Ultimately , I think that the New Romulus time gate that was introduced in the Rom Rep was a pretty decent way to hide grind -- as you not only worked on it to get moar stuffs from the shop , but also because you had additional content to unlock .
Think about it , if it was not designed that way , you could have been done with New Romulus in what ... anywhere between one and five days of play session -- and then you'd have been right back at "give us moar content" .
Another effective way to hide the grind would be the inclusion of "distractions" such as a FE or a new PvP map every ... (insert your own timeframe here that seems reasonable to you) .
Cryptic say that they do put in "stuff" between Seasons .
To this I have to ask : is Cryptic putting in the right stuff ?
Cryptic seems to think that every new FE has to be either a showcase of some new Tech , or some other flashy thing .
To this I say : no .
If we keep buying starships that share many of the same basic lines (some likely even share the same basic framework that get's resized reshaped and recolored) -- why can it be that we spend money (aka occupy ourself's) with visual content that is being reused , but we can't (according to Cryptic) occupy ourself's with backgrounds that get tweaked and reused ?
If one Cryptic employee can make "Alpha" in his spare time , imagine what two could do ?
Cryptic needs to understand that we need distractions and that we need predictable distractions .
Predictable keeps the mind at ease .
Unpredictable keeps the thought unsure .
And what we have right now is ppl who are unsure of what Cryptic will/won't do .
And considering Cryptic's track record ... , that's NOT where you want to have your fan base at , 'cause every little misstep on Cryptic's part get's piled on top of that lack of ease/assuradness , and that's just fuel to the flames .
/that's it , I'm done making sense , where is something I can flame ?
I suppose the big problem with the current situation.. is that you not only have to grind, but you also have high costs along with that grind. Translation: you have to grind.. so that you can grind.
In order to 'grind' one of the reputations, you need to grind marks, dilithium, and however-much in EC for the other components. This is creating a system where everything you would do, ultimately has to all go into that 'meta-grind' without leaving.. pocket change.. for the player to enjoy. Furthermore, even after unlocking things via 'The Grind', you still have to grind even more to actually be able to purchase your 'reward'.
Now, I fully understand and support having resource sinks, but what we have are not 'sinks' - they're all-consuming black holes that will devour everything you've got. The requirements to progress seep into every facet of what you do.. which makes it feel more like a job instead of recreation(although the regimented 'daily' timers contribute a lot to that feeling as well).
Ironically, however, I think part of the problem might be that there are not enough interesting things to invest resources into right now. Perhaps once more 'fluff' reputations are implemented and the crafting system gets overhauled, people won't feel like they're forced into playing the game a certain way.
Options.. are a wonderful way to dilute the perception of 'grind' because the player makes a 'choice' to pursue a treadmill.
In the short term, I think two things that would go a long way in helping would be to add reputation gains directly to some missions(as an alternative to credit-sinking) and adding fleet marks to a wider selection of activities(both solo and group so people with different playstyles can contribute to their fleets in their own ways).
Yep...but I never really saw STO as catering to the PvP crowd much at any point that I can recall, and it's not exactly inviting or easy to access. There's no area of the galaxy you can just roam into if you want to get funky, you have to queue for it. There's no specific PvP gear or ships to obtain, no PvP specific reward system or ranking system that I'm aware of for Fleet's or individual players. Last I heard, 'balance' was also an issue(but when is it not, tbh?).
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
The o3 - Killed you good
I agree to a certain point, STO has never created or attempted a good balance when it comes to anything that is pvp, unless you want to count waiting in a queue which isn't and iam sure that Cryptic could certainly come up with another means to satisfy that in a more realistic sense than a final endgame of losing what you have. Alot of good solutions have been introduced on many different topics in the forums and we have seen nothing to create that, this idea that queue a pvp is joke cheap way around the satisfactory of the game. But, if Cryptic wanted to introduce something it would go along way in the game. Example, we had heard about a territory system, well that would be great way to introduce a pvp situation within the game that would be persistence instead of the artificial attempt at what exist as pvp currently. Though i wont hold my breath, as that solution would make way too much sense.
Cheers,
T
You want to know what actual grind is, go play PWI. Yeah, T5 rep is a couple of weeks of the same thing. But if you demand the best gear you got to earn it. STOs grind is minor.
People are playing a Star Trek game to save the galaxy and be heroic?! When they can measure epeen by spamming keybinds instead? That's some twisted priorities.
1) Lack of variety
This is both from the limited number of options to gain what I want combined with the terrible reward balance issue. Only two STF exist in my eyes (ISE/CSE) I love Azure Nebula but I get more marks doing the daily in the sector, etc etc.
1a) Lack of surprises
The Defari dailies are some of the best, simply because they rotate what one you get in some places and the hunt for the rare bosses. Wouldn't it be awesome to queue up for an Azure Nebula and have a rare Scimitar worth 10 pts spawned in the center with a crapton of defensive ships? Bad idea perhaps but I think you get where I'm going with this one.
1b) Lack of Style variety
Starbase Blockade was the first item to make something other than DPS useful. Azure Nebula is kind of like that too but not really for PuGs. Yet there is not a single Tau Daily that uses something similar and it makes me sad.
2) Lack of side rewards
Why are STFs so great? You get dilitihium to do whatever you want with AND omega marks. Not true for fleet mark grinding or rommie marks. And potential purple Mk 12 awesome stuff.
2a) Lack of progressive rewards
As stated before, who wants a Mk 10 shield when they have a month of grinding to get the mk 12? Very few. However if that Mk 10 shield could be used to reduce the cost of getting the Mk 12 so one wasn't wasting currency to aquire it that just might be a good thing you know?
3) Poor UI implementation
The grind is so 'in your face' thanks to the UI methods. Sad but true.
All IMHO.